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Hmmmm-I guess I'm just dense today. Don't really understand what you are doing.

By "tree straps" I assume you mean what is usually referred to as tree huggers??

If that is so, then I have a question: why bother with the webbing at all? On any fair sized tree, you are still going to have the rope bearing on the tree itself. I've never used any tree with less than a 1' diameter, so the circumference is a little over 3' and that 16" of webbing wouldn't make much difference. Where we hike, smaller diameter trees are just very scarce. I guess if you can find trees with a diameter on the order of 8" or so then the 16" of webbing will cover most of the circumference.

Since if that is true, why not just use all rope huggers?

Have you had any problem with the dyneema coating gripping the AL toggle so hard that the toggle is very, very hard to remove?

On our Amsteel and AS-78 rope huggers we had to abandon the Marlin Spike since the Samthane coating became almost solidly welded to metal toggles after a night's hanging. It would usually take on the order of 5 to 10 minutes minimum to break the bond and remove the toggle. We found that wood toggles were not reliable since the compression forces on the toggle using 3 mm Amsteel or AS-78 would nearly cut trail stick toggles through. Using Oak dowel toggles, the compression of the oak was very significant. That presented the problem that the groove made by the compression, combined with the grip of the Samthane, made removing the oak toggles impossible except by cutting the toggle through. Not a good solution.

So if you have found a method of keeping the Samthane from bonding to the AL toggle over a nights hang, I would dearly love to know how you do it. We have tried mirror polished Stainless steel and TI and have the same problem in both.

I'm pretty sure you could easily make the webbing part 5',6',15' etc and the rest dyneema or amsteel. Why not use rope huggers? I have a hunch you may know why. My .02, anyway.

I had the same thoughts as TiredFeet about using 16 inches of webbing for what I think of as a tree hugger and would be interested in what diameter trees that is used for as well as some of the details of how it is used for larger than 8 inch diameter trees, if in fact it is. I don't recall anyone using that small a length of webbing... do they?

I would think that short of a hugger is very uncommon. Maybe he's in Texas right now? Colorado certainly has bigger trees than that. Maybe that's just a 1/4 scale demo? I agree with you, though. That short of webbing is pointless on a big tree.

I'm in Colorado--I made these specifically for a Colorado Trail biking trip this summer (biking the Colorado Trail from Denver to Durango)--most the trail averages about 10,000' elevation and most the trees up there are pine, spruce, fir and some aspen a bit lower so I really don't expect bigger trees. I made these for 1' diameter trees (and less) basically, although larger diameter with a couple sticks would be acceptable to me. Most of the force on the bark is at the back with most of the shear being at where the straps pull away from the tree which is easily countered with a couple vertical pieces of wood under the strap. Definitely not designed for a Redwood.

If your assured of hanging from small enough trees then a shorter tree strap is really all that is needed. I don't see the point in attaching rope to both ends of the strap to attach to your hammock suspension line. If the rope is coming into contact with the tree then your tree straps are to short and you run the risk of damaging the tree. That is what most of us are doing with the tree strap in the first place, protecting the tree and protecting our ability to hang from them. People start leaving marks on trees because they aren't using long enough tree straps and our ability to hang from the trees will be rapidly outlawed.

You can argue whether it actually hurts the tree or not but if it leaves marks it will be bad for hangers.